Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1887-07-16

all the psnt-up affection at my nature upon
her. Then money that was to come to me
went elsewhere, and she discarded me. I
pleaded with her as / have never pleaded
with any living creature before or since,
Tor / was caught by her sweet face, and
loved her; and in the end, 10y way Of an
swer, she took me to the glass, and stood
side by side with me, and looked into it.
Now" she said. IF | am Beauty, who
are your and | cursed her and fed. That
was when | was only twenty.
And so / stood and stared, and felt q sort
or grim satisfaction in the sense of my own
loneliness-for | had neither father nor
mother nor brother-and as I did SO there
came a knock at my door.
l listened before l went to open it, for It
was nearly twelve o'clock at night, and I
was in no mood to admit any stranger. I
had but one friend in the college, or, in
deed. IN the world; perhaps it was he.
just then the person outside the door
coughed, and | fastened to open it, for l
knew the cough.
A tall man of about thirty, with the ~
mains OF great personal beauty, came hur-
rying in, staggering beneath the weight OF
a massive iron box which he carried by q
handle In his right hand. He placed the
box upon the table, and then fell into ~
awful fit OF coughing. He coughed and
coughed till his face became quite purple,
and at last he sunk into q chair and began
to spit up blood. Ipoured out some whisky
into a tumbler and gave 1t to him. He
drank it and seemed better, though his
better was very bad indeed.
why did you keep me standing In the
cold?" he asked; "you know the draughts
are death to me-"
II did not know who it was" / answered.
"You are a late visitor"
"Yes; and l verify believe 1t is my last
VISIT" he answered, with q CHASTITY at
attempt at a smile. II an done for, Holly
II am lone for. I do not believe that I
shall see tomorrow
NONSENSE l said. "Let me go for q
doctor"
He waved me back imperiously with his
hand. 1T is sober sense; but l want no
doctors, / nave studied medicine, and I
know all about 1t. No doctors can help
me. My last hour has come! For q year
past | have only lived by a miracle. Now
listen to me rs you never listened to any
body before, TO; you will not have the OPP
portunity of getting me to repeat my words.
We have been friends for two years;
now tell me how much do you know about
me?'
II know that you are rich, and nave had
n fancy to come to college long after the
age that most men leave it. | know tina
you have been married, and that your
wife died; and that you have been the best,
indeed, almost the only, friend l ever had"
did you know that / have a SOM"
mo"
81 have. He Is five years old. He cost
me his mothers life, and | have never been
able to bear to look upon his face in conse-
quence. Holly, If you will accept the trust,
! am going TO leave you the boys sole
guardian"
sprung almost out of my chair. "lfe"
] said.
ayes, you. 1 have not studied you for
two years for nothing. | have known for
for some time that | could not last, and
since | realized the fact | have been search
ing for some one to whom l could confide
the boy and this and he tapped the iron
box. You are the man. Holly; for, like q
rugged tree, you are hard md sound at
core. Listen; the boy will be the last sur.
vivor of one OF the most ancient families
in the world. that is, rs far as families can
be traced. You will laugh at me when ]
say il, but one day it will be proved to you
beyond IA doubt that the founder of the
family, my siXty-ffth or sixty-siXth lineal
ancestor, was an Egyptian priest Of Isis,
though he was himself OF Grecian extrao-
ton, and was called Kallikrates, or the
Strong and Beautiful, or, to be still more
accurate, the Beautiful in Strength! Ills
father was, / believe, one Of the Greek
mercenaries raised by Hakor, n Mendesian
prince of the twenty-ninth dynasty. In or
about the year 800 before Christ, just at
the time Of the final fall Of the Pharaohs.
this Kallikrates broke his vows of celibacy
and fed from Egypt with a princess OF
royal blood, who had fallen in love with
him, and was finally wrecked upon the
coast of Africa, somewhere, as | believe,
in the neighborhood of where Delagoa
Bay now is. or rather to the north of 1t, he
and his wife being saved, and all the re-
nainder Of their company destroyed IN one
way or another. Here they endured great
hardships, but were at last entertained by
the mighty queen of a savage people, q
white woman Of peculiar loneliness, who,
under circumstances which | can not enter
into, but which you will one day learn, X
you live, from the contents OF the box,
finally murdered my ancestor, Kallikrates.
His wife, however, escaped, how, / know
not, TO Athens, bearing Il milo WIN hef,
whom she named Tisisthenes, or the
Mighty Avenger. Five hundred years OF
more afterward the family migrated to
Rome under circumstances Of which no
trace remains, and here, probably with the
idea Of preserving the idea OF vengeance
which we find set out in Tisisthenos, they
appear TO have pretty regularly assumed
the cognomen Of Vindex, or Avenger.
Here, too, they remained for another five
centuries or more. till about TO A. D., when
Charlemagne invaded Lombardy, where
they were then settled, whereon the head
of the family GEMS to have attached him.
self to the great emperor, and TO have re-
turned with him across the Alps, and final
ly to have settled in Brittany. Six gener-
atoms later his lineal representative
crossed to England in the reign of Edward
the Confcssor, and in the time of William
the Conqueror was advanced To great hon.
or and power. From that time till the
present day I can trace my descent without
a break. Not that the Vinccys-for that
was the final corruption OF the name after
its bearers took root in English sOil-have
been particularly distinguished they
never came much to the fore. Sometimes
they were soldiers, sometimes merchants,